Women's rights and equality have been a problem since the beginning of time. It seems that women have always been the inferior gender; women have always been controlled by men in one way or the other. In the earlier times, women were expected to be wives and mothers and they were not allowed to have jobs. Women were expected to take care of the house, the children, and their husbands, along with providing their husbands whatever they wanted whenever they wanted it. Women were not taken seriously by men; whatever a woman said to the men in her life it did not mean anything to them.
In the novel The Awakening, Edna goes through the struggle that every woman would have went through in the late nineteenth century. If women were not expected to be mothers and wives, Edna would not be one. But, because the era she lives in practically forces her into marriage and motherhood she has to. Edna's husband controls her like she is just an object and he shows Edna love and affection for the appearance of a perfect marriage. Edna is controlled by all the men in her life in the novel, and by the end she realizes that she can not truly know who she is as an individual in her society. This is the problem that all women went through; they pretty much did not have an individual identity. Men controlled everything about women and who they were, and the women had no choice to be themselves.
Today, women's rights and equality have improved so much, but women are still not totally equal to men. Women have the right to vote and get a job these days, and it is no longer expected that women get married or have children. However, women are still discriminated against and sometimes cannot get the same jobs men get and they are not paid equally with men. I think that enough time has passed that our society today should realize the importance of equality between women and men. I think society should realize by now that men and women are both human and there is no reason for there to be discrimination against women. Women should be treated like equals to men, and should no longer be controlled by men in any way. Discrimination and prejudice should not be acceptable in any forms; whether it be between the genders or race or for any reason.
